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New Mexico's Supreme Court fined attorney Stephen Aarons $5,000 and held him in contempt after he submitted an appeal brief containing AI-invented witnesses and false police testimony about a shooter's appearance. Aarons admitted he used ChatGPT expecting it to produce a reliable trial summary but never checked its accuracy before filing it in his client's murder case.
China's Supreme People's Court published new guidance directing lower courts on how to handle civil disputes stemming from AI misuse, covering deepfake video and audio, sexualized synthetic content, financial fraud, digital privacy violations, and algorithmic pricing based on surveillance. The 24-article opinion follows an earlier ruling against a company that used AI to force out an employee, and aims to give judges a consistent framework for these emerging cases.
On 10 September 1897, London cab driver George Smith crashed his Bersey electric taxi into a building on New Bond Street after it swerved and mounted the pavement while he was drunk. He was arrested, examined by a police surgeon, and the next day pleaded guilty at Marlborough Street Police Court to being drunk in charge of a vehicle, receiving a 20-shilling fine.
The U.S. carried out another round of military strikes targeting tankers carrying Iranian oil, escalating pressure on Tehran's crude exports. Separately, the Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to approve use of a voter verification system, and Meta launched a new consumer-facing AI agent.
The Supreme Court ruled on September 4 that broadcast TV stations must sell election ads to political parties and joint fundraising committees at the same lowest unit charge rates required for individual candidates. The order came after the National Republican Congressional and Senatorial Committees petitioned the court, overturning a Fourth Circuit ruling that had sided with Democratic candidates who challenged an FCC notice mandating the discount.
New Jersey's attorney general has asked the Supreme Court to resolve whether states can regulate sports wagers offered through prediction markets like Kalshi. The move follows a split between federal appeals courts: the 3rd Circuit ruled such bets are federally regulated swaps outside state control, while the 9th Circuit found they are simply gambling by another name and can be blocked by states like Nevada.
Billionaire investor Leon Black skipped a scheduled sworn deposition before the House Oversight Committee on Thursday, instead filing a federal lawsuit seeking to block subpoenas tied to the panel's investigation into Jeffrey Epstein. Committee leaders responded by saying they would consider holding Black in contempt of Congress.
A divided Supreme Court, in a 5-4 order, allowed construction to continue on President Trump's planned $400 million White House ballroom while legal challenges to the project move through lower courts. The majority found the National Trust for Historic Preservation likely lacked standing to sue, citing government claims the project addresses security concerns, while Chief Justice Roberts led a dissent arguing the project is likely unlawful without congressional approval.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation is pushing back against a wave of lawsuits in which major rightsholders ask courts to broaden copyright protections in response to generative AI. EFF argues this mirrors past panics over VTRs, player pianos, and cameras, technologies once feared to destroy creative industries but which instead expanded them. It warns that rightsholders' 'market dilution' theory, claiming AI tools threaten creative markets simply by existing, would improperly stretch copyright law based on speculation rather than evidence.
The Washington Post reports that private conversations users have had with AI chatbots like ChatGPT and Claude are increasingly surfacing as evidence in court proceedings. In one case, a financial executive facing federal fraud charges tried to shield his Claude conversations from prosecutors, but a judge ruled that attorney-client privilege did not apply since the chatbot is not a lawyer and his own attorneys hadn't directed him to use it.
The 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Kalshi's bid to stop Nevada from regulating its prediction market operations, siding with the state's gambling regulators and attorney general who sued Kalshi in February for allegedly operating without a sports gambling license. The ruling adds to a patchwork of conflicting state and federal legal outcomes for Kalshi, which also faces action from Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York and Arizona, even as a separate court found New Jersey lacks authority to regulate the platform.
A commentary piece argues that if corporations enjoy legal personhood under the Fourteenth Amendment, they should also face the equivalent of capital punishment for serious wrongdoing. It traces this idea to 'judicial dissolution,' citing the 1889 New York Supreme Court case that forced the North River Sugar Refining Corporation—a 17-company sugar monopoly—to liquidate for abusing its charter through price-fixing and consolidation.